


his ruins were beautiful

by softlyforgotten



Series: apocalyptic [1]
Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-22
Updated: 2009-08-22
Packaged: 2017-10-22 22:41:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/243376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softlyforgotten/pseuds/softlyforgotten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A post-apocalyptic AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	his ruins were beautiful

"There's a boy in the next town," Toro says, "but people say he's crazy."  


*

 

Mikey says, "come on. time to go," and Gerard stirs fitfully. The moon is huge and slightly off-colour through the holes in the stone; Gerard feels sick. It's cold, and Mikey's hand is shaking a little when he helps Gerard up. They stand there for a moment, breath fogging up the air, and then Mikey says, "Gerard. We really have to go."

"Yeah, I know," Gerard answers, and slings his backpack over one shoulder. They walk out of the remains of their house, and don't look back.

*

In Gerard's backpack can be found the following things: one length of rope, four bruising apples, a rug that is really borderline rag, a flashlight with dead batteries, a box of candles, two boxes of matches, a box of coloured pencils, four paper bags, two photographs of the same couple and one of an older woman, a guitar pick, a knife, a small sketchpad, a wooden doll with blurred features, scotch tape, two and a half packets of cigarettes, three green crayons of varying shades, four pages torn out of a book called _Adventures Of Your Very Own!_ detailing how to light a fire, seven lead pencils (three of which are sharpened), two pairs of sunglasses (one with a missing lens), a cake of soap, a piece of charcoal and three bullets.

In Mikey's backpack there are: three bottles of water and a tarpaulin.

Mikey is _considerably better_ at leaving things behind than Gerard.  


*

The first night, they stop in an abandoned house and ransack through it for things to eat, but the place has been empty for weeks, and it stinks of rotting meat left in a fridge (electricity went out a month ago). Mikey finds a packet of aspirin half-full, though, and Gerard digs up small potatoes from the garden. They stash the aspirin away, and cook the potatoes in an awkward fire out on the stone garden path, and make faces when they come out burned on one side, practically raw on the other. They eat them anyway, too tired to try to amend their sad attempts at cooking.

Mikey falls asleep with his mouth open, glasses slipping down his face. Gerard reaches out and pulls them off, folds them and lays them aside carefully so they won't get cracked or rolled on in the night. Then he slides underneath the blanket and wraps a cold arm around Mikey's waist, presses his face into Mikey's neck until the dark isn't so overwhelming.

When they wake up in the morning, the coals in the fire are black and dull, no red glow. They burn Mikey's inquisitive fingers when he reaches out, anyway, and he winces, raises them instinctively to his mouth and sucks. Gerard's eyebrow raises and Mikey looks away, caught in terrible young clichés under Gerard's wry, condescending gaze.

Mikey doesn't say anything, but the unspoken argument hangs between them and the morning's walk is tense.  


*

On the second night, they sleep in an old shed that smells of horses; on the third, in an orchid with Mikey's tarp strung out over two blankets to provide shelter against the rain that never comes.

On the fifth day, Gerard throws away the flashlight, the pencils, the crayons, the sketchpad, the broken pair of sunglasses and the wooden doll. Mikey doesn't say anything, but he makes Gerard wait while he digs a hole to bury them in, deep enough into the ground that scuffing over the surface doesn't dislodge them.

On the ninth day, Gerard draws a small, makeshift map of how far they've come and the landmarks they've seen along the way in charcoal on the back of one of the paper bags. He folds his lips tight and pretends he can't hear when Mikey says, "we're not going back, Gerard, you know that, right? Gerard?"

On the eleventh day, they hit a stretch of open highway with nothing around them, and they're forced to roll under a hedge to sleep for a relative sort of safety. After the first half hour of restless slumber, Gerard wakes and sits up as well as he can under the branches, arms hugging his knees to his chest, not willing to sleep for the nightmares. Mikey sleeps still and quiet, and Gerard watches him and bites down on his lip so that his teeth don't chatter when (very, very occasionally) the cars drive by. Gerard doesn't like to think about what kind of person can get their hands on petrol anymore.

They walk for miles the next day, not stopping for food or rest, though Gerard's dizzy with lack of sleep and Mikey has bruises around his wrist where Gerard's been holding on by the end of the day. But they get past the highway, to another country town with stale bread in successively more ruined houses, another place they can keep surviving for a little bit longer, until they get somewhere.

On the thirteenth day, Gerard says, quietly, "Mikey? where are we going?" and Mikey doesn't answer.

On the fourteen day, Gerard says, "fuck you, you don't even know."  


*

 

Without expectation, hope or conscious effort, they get better at it. Gerard supposes it was inevitable. He still thinks it's a betrayal on the world's half that they didn't get better in time.  


*

 

For records sake, here is another list of things that were inevitable:

1\. They learn to sleep hungry,  
2\. Gerard starts to ration his cigarettes,  
3\. old newspapers found in bins become something wildly coveted, and,  
4\. they meet other people.  


*

 

Mikey wakes him up when the moon's still quite low in the sky. Gerard fell asleep early; there's not much to stay up late for anymore. Mikey curls his fingers around Gerard's shoulders and shakes a little more forcefully after Gerard stirs and mumbles something blearily, but it's not until he says, "Gerard," in a careful, neutral voice that Gerard sits up properly and blinks at the crowd of people in front of him.

The night's dim, with no stars; the strangers come at him as flashes in the dark. A wide, fake grin with too many teeth; red hair dangling limp and greasy; a hat jammed on low; a pair of wide, curious, almost-earnest eyes.

"Hi," Smiley says, and there's something cruel in the flash of his eyes. Hat puts a hand on his shoulder; it looks companionable, but Gerard can see the warning there.

"You shouldn't be here," Red Hair says, flatly. Gerard gapes a little up at them, and tries to work out the exact location of his hand through the fuzz of pins and needles. He thinks maybe if he moved fast enough he might be able to get the knife out of his bag, but two of the four strangers have hands lingering casually at their waists and Mikey is in front of him, unprotected. Gerard concentrates on not shaking. He remembers following his grandpa out one afternoon on a trek through the bush one afternoon, spotting a fox following a rabbit. _Look_ , his grandpa had said, _see the doe's eyes, all glassy? The fox knows she's afraid, knows that he's won now._

Gerard opens his mouth, only Mikey's talking, quiet and calm and confident. "There's nowhere else to be," he says, and Smiley lets out a shuddering breath, smile faltering a little bit. The guy with the hat peers out from under the cap, and Red Hair exchanges an unreadable look with the guy with the nice eyes.

Then he turns back to them, studies them. "I'm Andy," he tells them finally, as though it's a confession.

"Mikey," Mikey replies, "and that's my brother. Gerard. We're running away."

Smiley lets out a rough bark of laughter. "Who isn't?" he says, and then, as though he regrets the harshness of that, "I'm Pete. that's Patrick, and this is Joe."

"You still shouldn't be here," Andy says, but he smiles a little bit. Warily. Tentatively. "We can give you food, and information. places to go. But you can't stay here."

"No," Mikey says. It takes Gerard a moment to realise he's agreeing with them.  


*

 

Joe's good at cooking, and Mikey and Gerard eat ravenously, shoveling as much of the rice and vegetables mixed together into their mouths as they can, eating past being full and eventually the queasiness after that until they're content they can last for a day or even two without getting too deep into their rations, now. None of the guys say anything about their huge helpings; Pete looks amused, but stays silent.

After they've finished, Andy and Patrick talk, for almost two hours, scribbling out maps on scraps of paper, another piece with a long list of names and locations (Pete and Joe interrupting now and again – _don't forget, oh what about, and Whatsherface down near Beckett's old ground_ ). They also give them a proper road map (Mikey's eyes light up) and a packet of AA batteries. Gerard smiles with something close to humour, thinks of the flashlight, buried miles back on the road.

They sleep, all six of them, on a ripped mattress with stuffing escaping out one corner, squished in together for body heat. Gerard hasn't been so comfortable for a month – his dreams are unmemorable, if he dreams at all.  


*

The next day, the four stand at the doorway of the ruined building, shoulder to shoulder, and wave as Gerard and Mikey set down the road again. the sky is bright blue overhead, and when Gerard touches Mikey's shoulder, almost tentatively, it's warm with the sun.

"They'll be okay," Gerard says.

Mikey grins, a rare flicker of happiness. "I know."  


*

 _You need to find Bryar and Toro. they'll know where to find her_ , Andy had said. Gerard wakes up sweating from a dream of blue eyes and blonde hair. He could see the man's face, but even so Gerard knew that he was walking away.  


*

Forty-two days in, and there's a storm. Their shirts are soaked through and Mikey wraps his arms around his ribcage (he's always been so thin; Gerard realises, startled, that he himself has lost enough weight in the past month that they are practically the same build) and shudders. Gerard can't see properly through the thundering pelt of the rain and the fog snaking around their ankles, and that makes him nervous, ears straining for noises over the rain.

It's luck, more than anything, because Mikey bangs his shin hard against the white gate and swears "Mother _fucker_ ," before Gerard squats next to it, peers at the gold plate on the front of it.

"Jesus," he says, "Mikey, a rose. didn't Joe say—"

"Those kids they knew," Mikey answers, almost reverently. "We can—"

"Come on," Gerard says, and pushes the gate open, too tired to think of the possibilities of being wrong, just needing to be dry and safe and _visible_. They stumble down the path and Gerard bangs against the door, twice normally, and then leaning his whole weight into it, mouthing _please, anybody_.

A boy opens the door, finally, eyes narrowed and blue, soft hair falling around his jaw. "Who are you?" he asks tightly, and Gerard closes his eyes for a moment.

"Spencer?" Mikey guesses, and when the guy jumps he smiles wanly, tells him, "Pete says hi."  


*

The cabin is completely whole, somehow having emerged unscathed from the bombs and then the riots and looting, and Spencer ushers them into a kitchen which has a _sink_ (though no running water) and a supply of candles in a drawer. There's a slightly scruffy looking guy there who regards them warily after Spencer introduces him as Jon and doesn't say anything.

Spencer says, "You really haven't picked a good time to turn up," and then in the same breath, "Are you hungry?"

Gerard nods yes to both things and they eat cold boiled carrots and potatoes. Jon takes another bowl out of the room before he comes back to eat his own serve; Gerard's curious, but Spencer's jaw is clenched tight and he doesn't say anything, not even when Jon goes back out a while later and returns with the untouched meal.

"So you know Pete," Spencer says, breaking an awkward silence.

"Kind of, yeah," Gerard replies. "We ran into him and his friends almost two weeks ago. They helped us out with names, and directions, and stuff."

"Where are you heading?" Jon asks. Gerard looks away, and Mikey looks tired suddenly, and angry.

"We're not really sure," Mikey tells them. "Our parents were killed in, um, the riots."

"I'm sorry," Spencer says, tonelessly. Gerard feels anger rise in him, but Jon's looking at Spencer with something between anxiety and terror in his eyes, and his fingers linger on Spencer's lower back. Gerard closes his mouth, and Mikey nods tersely in response.

"Yeah. anyway, our gran was away on holiday, maybe a few weeks north of here. Andy said it sounded like she was near these guys, Bob Bryar and someone Toro, and that we should try and find them, 'cos they'd know where she was, if she was there. So. That's where we're heading, really. But it's kind of. Our direction could be off a fair bit, we don't know."

"You seem to be doing okay," Jon says. "If you keep heading via the main roads from here you should be able to find them."

"Great. Thanks. For that, and for, you know, putting us up."

"Don't worry about it," Jon tells them. "You can stay here till the rain stops, at least."

"It'll be a few days, still," Spencer says suddenly. He looks exhausted, and sad. Gerard watches him covertly as he stands and walks out of the room.

Later, Jon brings in a bucket that's filled with rain water and pours it into the sink, washes the dishes. Mikey dries them; Gerard watches them both, the lines of their backs. The grey light of the afternoon filters through the window and there's no shadows on them, no light to play with. Gerard's fingers twitch, but his sketchpad's gone and he's not going to waste the paper bags on a whim.

He stands and wanders out – Jon turns his head and watches him, but doesn't tell him not to go. The cabin's bigger than it looks, full of little rooms that turn in on themselves and lead into new places. Gerard's not really _lost_ – he's sure he could find the way back if he needed to – but it's nice to pretend so, to let his feet carry him on forwards through room after room after room.

And then finally, there's one that's not empty. He doesn't realise there are people there at first, and he wouldn't have at all if one of them hadn't been singing softly, crooning in a low voice, dark head bent over a bed. _In_ the bed is one of the most beautiful people Gerard has ever seen; he has long fingers that rest lightly on the top of the covers, and a face with sharp cheekbones, and long eyelashes that cast shadows reminiscent of tall, spiky flowers. There is a large purple and yellow bruise on his temple, and his fingers on one hand are bound in white cloth. his eyes are closed.

The boy by the bed looks up when Gerard takes an unconscious step backward. There are dark shadows under his eyes and they are very slightly red-rimmed, like he was crying a long time ago. There is a faint flicker of surprise in his eyes, but mostly his face is just dull resignation.

"Who are you?" he asks. His voice carries too easily through the room, naturally vibrant, only gone grey.

"Gerard," Gerard tells him, but the stranger has already turned back to the boy in the bed, watching him breathe with eyes that are huge and hungry.  


*

When Gerard steps out of the room Spencer's waiting there, his face unreadable. He curls fingers around Gerard's elbow and wordlessly leads him away.

Eventually, Gerard says, somewhat hopeless, "I didn't mean to intrude. I—"

"It really doesn't matter," Spencer answers, matter-of-factly. "That was Brendon. The guy in the bed is Ryan. He's dying."

Gerard turns a little, gapes at him. "What?"

"Ryan," Spencer tells him, somewhat bitterly, "is a stubborn little fuck who doesn't know when to shut his mouth, or run away. He and Brendon were out looking for survivors a couple of days after the latest bombings. When the car pulled over, Ryan just got… angry, I guess. _Stupid_ little idiot, of course he couldn't – anyway. Brendon tried to stop him, but." He shrugs. "Ryan was stronger than Brendon. And then the men in the car were stronger than Ryan."

"I'm sorry," Gerard whispers.

Spencer looks away. "Yeah. Me too."  


*

The rain stops three days later. Spencer says goodbye quickly and without emotion, disappears into another room when they're still packing. when Gerard looks at Jon, he just looks away, awkwardly.

"He doesn't mean to be so—"

"I know," Gerard says.

"It's just. with Ryan. and Brendon's kind of – we're not sure what he's going to do. When Ryan."

"I understand," Gerard says, and he does: the curve of Brendon's face towards Ryan; the quiet, desperate sound of his voice; the way his fingers trembled as he compulsively smoothed the bed covers, over and over again. Gerard understands, too, what it means, and that with every smooth stroke of his fingers Brendon only makes more creases – he only doesn't understand _how_ it came there.

Mikey says goodbye, then, when Gerard doesn't speak anymore, and thanks them again. The morning is clear and bright when they set out, but cold, and from down the road the little cabin, miraculously untouched as it is, looks as though it is about to slip off the edge of a precipice.  


*

They keep walking, because there's nothing else to do ( _nowhere else to be_ , Mikey had said. Gerard wonders, sometimes, when Mikey started taking charge). A few days away from the cabin, there's another storm, and they huddle under the relative cover two walls and half a crumbling roof. It's a bad one; this time, fire streaks down from the sky sometimes and the air smells rancid and almost acidic.

Later, in a broken mirror on the road, Gerard will look down and see his face streaked with charcoal that he doesn't remember choking his throat. Behind his thoughts, there is the faint buzz of the ludicrous, a newsreader handing over to the weather report: _hope is low, but reports show that tolerance levels are on the increase._ Gerard will laugh, hoarsely, and Mikey will look back at him swiftly, eyes dark and concerned.

The storm, though; in the end, Gerard and Mikey give up fronts of bravery and sink into the corner together, arms tight around each other. Mikey buries his face in Gerard's shoulders and Gerard would be lying if he didn't say that right then, more than anything, he just wants his mom.  


*

It's the first city they've been in since they left home and that, more than anything, makes Gerard realise that they're almost there, only the matter of finding the goddamn people now. He has a Place, though, a Where and a Why with only Who waiting out of reach, and he makes Mikey stop while he traces the rest of the route on the paper bag, fingers careful, lingering in some places. He doesn't want to forget: the ruined warehouse they spent the night at with Pete and Andy and Patrick and Joe; the garden where they found roses blooming in the wrong season, beautiful except for the slight sickly glow about them in the dark; the tiny cabin with the three lost boys waiting for Ryan to die; the road where Mikey fell and tore his jeans, scraped grazes along his knees and the heels of his hands and stayed there, on the ground, staring blankly at the black asphalt before Gerard literally _dragged_ him up and out of the way.

This time, Mikey doesn't say anything, lips folded tight against reproaches, but when Gerard looks up, fingers smudged with charcoal, Mikey's eyes are terribly old.

When they keep going, the initial happiness wears off – the city is worse than anything they've seen so far. windows are either smashed or boarded up with wooden boards or, failing that, cardboard. There is nobody else on the streets, but footsteps seemed to resound around them, the echo of their own and something more sinister, feet shuffling away and a breath of laughter. Mikey and Gerard drift closer together, shoulders and hips bumping, unwilling to show weakness, unwilling to step apart. Mikey lets out a breath that he's been holding and Gerard is startled by the suddenness of the sound, blinking at him.

Every now and again there is a streetlamp that is on, and then they don't even pretend to stay apart, Gerard's fingers curling around Mikey's wrists. it's hard not to be immediately distrustful of any kind of electricity at the moment, especially not with Spencer's story about Ryan and the cars.

They spend that night in an old bottle shop. All the alcohol has long since been taken, but there is broken glass on the counter next to the cash register and purple stains on the lino. The blanket has frayed away a lot more since they first set off, but it's enough that when they huddle together and pull it around them they are only a little bit cold.

In the morning, Gerard thinks, he will make everything alright. In the morning.  


*

 

They're woken by shrieks in the streets; the light is faint blue, and Gerard thinks it is half past five, maybe six. They peer warily out a window and there's two girls there, ripping at each other's clothing and half-shouting, half-sobbing. One of them, with short, dark hair and a round face that looks like it had once been the kind to smile all the time, reaches up and drags at a handful of the girl's hair; her fist slams awkwardly into the other's cheek.

Two men appear, shouting over the top of the girls' screams. One of them grabs the short haired girl, gathers her to his chest and holds on. his voice is soothing but he's still yelling over the girl's hoarse voice, and his voice carries clearly to Mikey and Gerard "Jamia, Jamia – come on, it's going to be – don't, honey, little girl, little girl, don't do that. we'll find Bob, don't—"

And Gerard and Mikey exchange a glance and awkwardly walk out the door, lingering at the edges of the scene. The man glances up and meets their eyes but doesn't acknowledge them, murmuring in the girl's ears. The other man is walking away with his fingers locked in a tight grip around the other girl's wrist; she has long, blonde hair and is sobbing, unsteady on her feet.

"Jamia," the man murmurs, voice low now that Jamia has subsided, is only crying quietly into his chest. "No, don't do things like that, honey. It doesn't change anything."

"She shouldn't say those things," Jamia says finally, voice torn and ugly from the strain she put it under. "She shouldn't. I told her not to say those things about him. He doesn't. He can't. Help it."

"I know," the man tells her. "I know, little girl. It'll be okay." He keeps on talking to her, and she starts to calm down, breath coming easier. His voice is almost a song; a strange, melodic rhythm in the words. Gerard is reminded, suddenly, of Brendon crooning over Ryan's bed, and he thinks that these days, that's all people can do – reach out.

He feels tired.

Mikey is the one who, yet again, responds when the man finally asks them who they are. "You said Bob," he says, slowly. "Are you talking about – Bob Bryar? We're looking for him."

The man narrows his eyes. "That's not what I asked. I said, who _are_ you?"

"Andy Hurley sent us," Gerard says, and that's a password of sorts, he supposes. The man regards them distrustfully for a moment, then nods and gestures for them to follow him when he sets off.  


*

they move slowly, because Jamia walks at a slow, shuffling pace with the man (who introduced himself unwillingly – Gerard wonders when names became such a fiercely protected thing – as Brian) keeping his arm around her, drawing her close to him. Gerard would think they were lovers, maybe, if it weren't for the way she was crying – the rough, inconsolable sobs – and the reason she had offered for fighting with that other girl.

When they get to a small block of burnt-out flats, Brian looks at them warily. "Stay here," he says, and disappears with Jamia, feet rattling downstairs towards the basement. Mikey and Gerard look at each other.

"We've been kinda stupid," Gerard offers up finally.

"Yeah." The word is an exhalation of Mikey's breath. Gerard laughs hoarsely, and Mikey offers him a slow, rueful smile. "But we've done the best we can."

"If grandma's here—"

"Then not much will change," Mikey tells him, honestly. "But it won't be just us, at least. It'll be good."

Gerard falls silent and then looks up at Mikey. The sun's just rising and he's silhouetted against it, slouching forward, hair falling in his eyes and over the glasses with one arm fastened on with tape. Mikey looks kind of small, but not afraid, and Gerard reaches out (reaches out, again and again, because that's the only thing he has left that he can do), brushes his fingers against Mikey's cheek.

Mikey looks at him, startled, and Gerard smiles. "Hey," he says, quietly. "Hey. You're good enough."

Mikey's answering smile is a reflection of the sun and the streetlamp, bright and awkward, and then Brian reappears and says, "You can come down, now."  


*

The steps leading down are a twisted kind of metal; some of them are charred and Gerard steps carefully, one in front of Mikey, making sure that the rotting stair can hold his weight, knuckles white with clenching the side. Brian seems quite unconcerned; he almost bounces from step to step, jumping about in a way that indicates he knows exactly where to land. once he skips a step altogether and Gerard spies the odd, brownish colour sneaking in between the dull silver and follows his lead. he only looks back at Mikey once; Mikey blinks tiredly at him and Gerard grins.

There's something about it, he thinks, even though if they fall they could die at worst, break a leg at best, something that makes him feel young and cheerful and full of hope. Skipping step to step, almost like a game. That's the way he thinks of it, at least; sunshine and daisies. Gerard breathes out and somewhere, his mom smiles.

The stairs end, eventually, like all stairs have to. Brian turns around for the first time to check they're with him, and Gerard jumps past the last, rotten looking, step and lands awkwardly, flinching when his ankle buckles a little. Brian looks impatient and Gerard flushes, fingers curling into fists; then Mikey lands beside him and their shoulders bump (Gerard can be brave again).

Brian says, "This way," and leads them down a passageway that soon turns into a concrete tunnel of sorts; Gerard realises that they've dug away from the original apartment, and feels cold, the weight of tons of dirt and rubble and the streets resting uncomfortably above them. The way is lit by the flashlight Brian has brought out, high-power with a beam that flashes from side to side. The shadows look as though they're alive.

Eventually the tunnel opens up into a basement, and Brian guides them up yet more stairs, climbing higher and higher into another apartment building. Gerard catches sight of a boarded up front door and wonders how much more dangerous it must be living in the city, how many more precautions you have to take. He thinks of Mikey and himself sleeping behind a simply closed door in that wine store, with breaks between the wood on the window where anyone could have peered in and seen them, and feels slightly ill.

And then, finally, the white, bare room. Mikey releases a breath; Gerard draws it in as his own. They step closer together, unconsciously, though Gerard is suddenly aware that, looking at them, Brian sees the likeness at last: not such obvious brothers, but something right there. In the spaces between, Gerard knows, they look exactly the same.

There are six people in there, besides them; Jamia is huddled in the corner with another, kind-looking girl, flipping through an old photo album, but Gerard's gaze is drawn immediately to a short, stocky man with blonde, scruffy hair, a lip ring and a slight beard. Blue, blue eyes; Gerard remembers his dreams and takes a step forward.

"Are you Bob Bryar?" he asks, and Mikey's head jerks towards them.

His blue eyes look amused when Bob says, "yeah, that's me."

Gerard's so close, he's _so close_ ; he forgets formalities and explanations and says, "Helena Way. We're looking for her. She's old, early seventies, I have a photo if you need it, just. Do you know her?"

Bob exchanges a glance with a guy with big, curly hair and says, slowly, "Helena? Long grey hair, keeps it in a plait the whole time?"

"Used to be a painter?" the guy with curly hair says, and then adds, "I'm Ray Toro, hi."

Gerard bites his lip to keep back the slow smile growing, nods his head in acknowledgment to Ray. Next to him, Mikey is grinning so hard that Gerard's cheeks ache in sympathy. "That's the one," Mikey says, half-laughing. "Yeah, that's her, have you – is she here?"

"Hey," Ray says, and steps forward to lay a hand on Mikey's shoulder. "Guys, I'm really sorry. Helena died about a month ago."

(Gerard is so close, he's _so close_ ; Mikey says, "what?" in a shallow sounding voice and Gerard is tired and hungry and sore.)

Everything goes black.  


*

Gerard wakes up and it's dark and Mikey's asleep next to him, frowning. His glasses are slipping off his face and there's faint tearstains on his cheek. There's a blanket thrown over them, much bigger and softer than the one they're used to, and when Gerard sits up Bob and Ray are watching him.

"Hey, did I—" Gerard begins, feeling stupidly embarrassed.

"Yeah," Ray interrupts, and then smiles, surprisingly sweetly. "Don't worry about it. You've been walking for miles, your brother said, and that was a big shock. I'm really sorry," he repeats. "She got pneumonia one night, and with no antibiotics—" he trails off.

"Anyway," Bob says, blue eyes clear in the semi-dark. "You can stay with us, if you like. There's room, and you'll be safe here. As safe as you can be."

Gerard bites his lip. "I appreciate the offer," he says softly, "but I don't know if. We've been looking for so long, I don't know if we're just going to. Stop, I guess." He laughs shortly. "It sounds stupid. There's no family left, anyway, I mean, we don't really have anything left to look for—"

"Gerard," Ray urges, and Gerard jumps at his name, before realising they must have been talking to Mikey. "We've seen kids like you and your brother before. Jesus, there's one who lives a couple of hours down the road from this place. You can't keep on going when there's nowhere left to go, you'll just. It drives you insane. Please, if you have something you need to do or somewhere you need to be, that's different but don't just _go_ for the sake of going." Ray's voice is kind of weary, like he's presented this argument a thousand times before, and lost. Bob leans forward, face oddly urgent in the flickering candlelight, but says nothing.

"Yeah, I'll, um. I don't know, I kind of think we have to do something? Or maybe, you know, it's just me. I can't stop, I need to – to _do_ something, break something, save something, I don't know. I can't _stop_ just yet."

"I think," Bob tells him slowly, intently, "this is a bad idea. I think if you leave now, you won't come back. Gerard, there's only so many safe places left. This is the _best place_ for you to be right now! I wish you'd stay, you – you nearly crossed the damn country in two months, I think we need you here. You could be so much help. There are people here to be saved, too."

Gerard waits for a long moment, and then he says, "I'll come back. I _promise_."

"I don't think you will," Bob says, calmly. "I'm not doubting your word or your intentions for a moment, but I know what happens out there. You can't stop, Gerard, unless you have something worth stopping for. This could be it. _Please_ let it be it."

Gerard's eyes flash; the room is tight, he feels claustrophobia tighten around his ribcage, his throat. "What can I say that will make you be _lieve_ – I can't stay here right now, Bob! I need to get away from this city. Just for a little bit longer, please, a couple of weeks, _two_ weeks, just a very little bit."

Ray looks down, but Bob is suddenly purposeful. "Fine – you'll make me believe if Mikey stays here."

Ray draws in a sharp breath; Gerard snaps, " _What_?"

"Go now," Bob tells him. "Go now, and leave Mikey here, and then I'll believe you when you say you'll come back."

Gerard's hands flutter wildly, like trapped birds; he slides closer across the dusty floor so that Mikey shifts and curls around him a little, breathing deep. "I. It's _Mikey_. I can't leave him behind."

"You won't be, though," Bob says, eyes dark. Ray looks away, uncomfortable. "You're coming back, Gerard, remember? you promised."

"I—"

"Two weeks, Gerard, isn't that right? Promise?"

Gerard looks down, and then at Mikey. He feels panic well up in his throat. "If I go," he says, roughly, "he'll never forgive me."

"So don't go."

Gerard's fingernails bite through his skin, and it is then he realises how hard he's clenching his fists. "I have to go. Bob, I _need_ him."

"We need _you_ , Gerard," Bob says, and he looks exhausted. "Listen to me. You're not broken, just yet, and that's more than one quarter of the people who live here already. You're clever and you can help us map stuff and Mikey knows how to get people to trust him with only a few words, and we _need_ you. both of you. Wake him up, if you have to, Gerard, and both of you can go. But listen to me when I say that without something to return for, you _won't come back_."

"I want to stay here," Gerard says miserably.

Bob nods. "That's good. We want you to stay, too."

Gerard's fingers linger on Mikey's skin; he pushes a lock of his hair out from behind his glasses. His fingers are soft, tentative, not wanting to wake him up, and then he lets out a breath and says, "Can I have some supplies?"  


*

Bob and Ray pack up a bag with matches and cigarettes, a flashlight and water and food, and a new, sharper knife folded in with a blanket. They hesitate when they walk him down to where the tunnel starts again, and then Bob says, "Listen. if you need someone, who's. Who has to be doing, going somewhere, too, then." He exchanges a helpless glance with Ray, who shrugs, smiles a little bit.

"There's a boy in the next town," Ray says, "but people say he's crazy."

Gerard looks back at them, something between confusion and hope, but they only smile at him again, then turn around and walk away. Gerard sets off down the tunnel, flashlight swinging uneasily from his hand – it's worse at night, and when someone scuttles out of the darkness and grabs at his arm he yells aloud in fright.

When he swings the flashlight around, though, the person who shies back from the light is only Jamia. She smiles blearily at him through the glare and then says, "Be kind to him, please. he can't help it." She presses a crumpled photo into his hand and then, when Gerard glances down at it, lets out a loud, startling sob and turns and runs.

Gerard keeps walking, studying the photo. a guy stares out from it, arms folded with a cigarette in one hand, dark hair and eyes watching him almost whimsically. There is a hint of a smile tugging at his lips, and one of his shoulders is hunched slightly higher – _well, am I doing this right?_ It's an uncomfortable looking photo, the guy in it clearly not enjoying the process, but Gerard tucks it in his pocket anyway.  


*

It's harder walking without Mikey. Gerard hasn't realised how much he counts on him; the quiet, steady companionship when they walk for hours and say nothing; or the stupid 'fast facts' Mikey will offer now and then with a half-grin, remnants from school lessons long ago. It all seems very far away now, and Gerard thinks, stepping out of the city sometime in the first few hours after dawn, that this is the very first time since the war began that he's been homeless.

Anyway, though: when he realises he's outside of the city he can breathe easy again.

(Although: _Helena_ , he thinks, and shoves his hands in his pockets to keep them from trembling.)  


*

Gerard falls asleep on the first night and dreams of the city he just left. Mikey's running, footsteps pounding on the streets: _Gerard!_ he screams, and his voice is raw and aching. Bob and Ray appear behind him, breathing heavily; Ray steps forward and slings an arm around his shoulder, pulls him close. Mikey doesn't seem to notice: _Gerard!_ he yells again, and the shout echoes up to the stars, pulling Gerard up with it. He soars higher and higher on the breath of Mikey's cries and then abruptly, turns and spirals down. He reaches out his hands but when he's just close enough, Mikey changes.

It's the guy from the photograph, and he grins widely at Gerard, flash of white between pink lips, then turns and runs away. Gerard goes to yell out but all that comes out is Ray's voice: _there's a boy in the next town,_ Ray-Gerard says, _but people say he's crazy._

Gerard wakes up sweating and terrified as headlights screech around the corner; he scrambles back into the hedge he's rolled out of and holds his breath until it goes by, fingers digging into his bag and clutching the knife.

When it does, he crawls out on the other side, away from the road, and keeps walking. This time, he keeps the knife tucked in his pocket.  


*

The buildings rise up out of the dark with the dawn. It's bigger than a town, Gerard thinks, though not quite big enough to be a city, and he draws closer warily. He can see smoke rising from a tall factory like building further in, and feels danger settle carefully on his skin, the scent of it.

He's maybe a mile in when the three men appear around the corner.

They're wearing crisp, ironed white shirts and pressed charcoal trousers; their hair is clean, recently washed, and their smiles are clear in the growing daylight. Two of them are holding knives, which they casually flick out of the handles. The one in the middle has a suspicious looking bulge in his jacket pocket.

Gerard stops and stands perfectly still. He holds his hands up outwards, empty and dust-stained.

The men don't seem to care. The two with knives grin and step forward. "Who are you, then?" one of them says, the friendliest sounding person Gerard has met so far. He is not so stupid as to think this is a good thing.

"No one," Gerard says, guardedly. "I'm just passing through."

"Oh?' the guy says, and Gerard slips his hand into his pocket, closes it around the handle of his knife. "Why didn't you skirt round the town, then, if you're not staying? It's not so big, it wouldn't have been hard."

"I didn't realise there'd be an issue," Gerard says, choosing each word carefully. This is wrong, apparently; the other man with the knife who has thus far been silent snarls and takes a running step forward – Talker grabs his arm, holds him back with a muttered, "Carn, Sam, hold it together."

"This is our ground, kid," Talker tells him, face twisting in an ugly way. "You've made a mistake coming here, that's clear, but we can hardly make exceptions for every idiot who stumbles onto our streets, can we?"

Gerard holds the knife up as a warning, but his hand is shaking dangerously, and the third man has pulled out a gun, anyway. They laugh and Gerard swears viciously under his breath, takes another step backward.

"Jesus," he says, speaking quickly, "come on, I didn't realise this was your – your territory, I didn't think there was going to be any trouble, I'll—"

"I'm sorry." A voice suddenly rings clear up above them. "Whose territory was that?"

Sam makes a odd, high-pitched noise, pointing up wordlessly to the roof they're standing near. There's a silhouette standing on it, the sun behind him making it impossible to decipher any facial features. Sam scuttles backwards and says in the same, odd, frightened voice, "Fuck. _Fuck_."

Talker goes very still, face suddenly white. "Easy there, Sam," he says. "Don't worry, about – _shit_ —" because Sam shrugs away from the man with the gun's easy hold on his shoulder and bolts away from the street, skidding down a side alley and out of sight.

Gerard, at first relieved, starts to think he's maybe fallen into even deeper shit, if that's possible. The guy on the roof is laughing quietly, but when Talker offers up a nervous chuckle in wary camaraderie, the laughter stops. Pointedly.

"Whose territory did you say this was, Spike?" the guy says again, voice calm and friendly.

"I – I didn't!" Spike cries. "That was all that guy!" He shoves an accusing finger towards Gerard, who takes an unconscious step back. "He's – he's the one you should be going after! Not us!"

"You know what?" The man on the roof has tilted his head down. Gerard catches a glimpse of a smile against the glare of the sun. "I don't believe you."

And then he takes a step forward and drops, straight onto the back of the guy with the gun, the one who hasn't said anything at all, so far. He shouts and lurches backward, trying to buck him off, but the guy clings on tight, and when Gerard catches sight of his face properly for the first time, he notices two things:

1\. It is twisted, teeth bared, in an expression of feral madness, and  
2\. he is the man from the photograph.

The man has pulled out his gun and is waving it wildly, trying to pull the trigger and aim as the guy from the photograph bites – actually _bites_ , and Gerard feels like he's wandered into some sort of alternate reality – and tears at his neck. there is a blur of movement, and then a gunshot rings clear; Gerard blinks and when he opens his eyes again there is a crumple of black coat on the ground and the guy from the photograph is prising the gun away from the man's surprised grip, still tight even in death.

Spike swears. "You little shit," he hisses, teeth clenched, and the guy studies the gun he's holding in an abstract, interested sort of manner, and then raises it and fires, just the once. Spike falls to the ground.

Gerard realises, in a detached way, that he's shaking.

The guy from the photograph turns on him and stalks forward, teeth bared, curled in a snarl. Gerard takes a wild step backward and stumbles on a rock; it slips out from under his foot and he kicks at it. It bounces across the road and the guy follows it with eyes that are suddenly curious and quite peaceful, and then drops the gun.

Gerard releases a loud breath. The guy looks at him and smiles, flashing white teeth and eyes warm and earnest. "Hi," he says, takes another step forward. "I'm Frank." He holds out his hand and Gerard stares at him, blinking quickly. He looks at Frank's outstretched hand but doesn't say anything, just curls his arms around himself.

Frank's face falls; he literally looks like he's about to cry, and Gerard's eyebrows go up but he finally extends his hand anyway, shakes Frank's as firmly as he can. "I'm Gerard," he tells him, and Frank beams.

"Nice to meet you, Gerard," he says, and then he shrugs with one shoulder, the gentle lift under his t-shirt like a cat, or a lion, and turns away. "I guess I'll see you around, then."

"Wait!" Gerard says desperately, and Frank turns with an amiable smile. Gerard opens his mouth and then closes it again, not quite sure of what to say. the clouds shift above him, and he squints suddenly into the sunlight; in the bright flare of light he can almost see Mikey's tense, concerned form standing next to him, managing to communicate _what the fuck do you think you're doing_ and _are you crazy_ and _I'll stay with you, anyway_ in the same slouch. Gerard smiles a little sadly at Mikey and tells him, _he's the closest thing to a direction I've got._ Then the clouds shade the day again and Gerard says, "I – some friends of yours sent me to find you," which, okay, not _technically_ true, but it's the best idea he's got right now. "Um. Jamia sent me."

Frank looks almost concerned; he tilts his head to the side and smiles a little oddly, as though Gerard is ill or crying or something of the like. "Gerard," he says gently, and it's a little odd, the way he uses Gerard's name when there's no real need to – but his voice is soft and soothing, as though speaking to a young child. "I don't _know_ anyone called Jamia."

"What?" Gerard blinks. "No, you do, she said that – here," and he digs the picture of Frank out of his pocket, holds it out to him. "She gave me this. Of you."

Frank takes it and sinks to the ground in a fluid movement, crossing his legs and resting his chin on his fist, studying the photo with something like interest. He looks fascinated, smoothing his fingers over the crumples in the photo and finally he looks up and says, "Is this me?"

Gerard stares, and says blankly again, "What?"

"I haven't seen a mirror in a while," Frank explains, smiling. Gerard looks over his shoulder; there are large black-tinted windows on what used to be a department store or something just across the street, and his grimy reflection in it stares back at them. Frank follows his gaze, and smiles politely at the cross-legged reflection of him sitting there, no recognition in his eyes. "Can I keep the photo?" he says, and Gerard nods dumbly.

"Great." Frank smiles suddenly again, and this one catches Gerard off-guard, bright and brilliant and sincerely grateful. Gerard takes a step back, and Frank whirls around, dashes off across the ground, footsteps echoing on the pavement.

"Hey!" Gerard calls again, and Frank stops, turns. "Can I – can I come with you?"

Frank looks a little bit bewildered, but he shrugs one shoulder again and says, "If you like." He skips across the last bit of the road and Gerard grabs his backpack and dashes after him, a little out of breath – Frank moves fast and light, around the corner and to a small alley coming off the main road, with a pile of dumpster bins underneath. Frank points up cheerfully and then hoists himself onto the largest of the bins, scraping upwards with a clang when his knee hits the metal. He doesn't seem to care; instead, he reaches up and curls his fingers around the edge of the roof, scrambling upwards and onto the flat roof. Gerard gapes from down below and Frank calls down to him, "Coming?"

"Yes," Gerard murmurs, and then, louder, "yeah!" He pulls himself up on top of the bin, gritting his teeth; his t-shirt rides up and the sharp metal edge scrapes along his belly, and his knees hit the bin too, only several times in sharp succession, and _Jesus_ he's going to have some bruises tomorrow. Finally he stands up on the bin and Frank grins at him, sharp white teeth flashing, then extends a hand. Gerard takes it a little warily and with his other hand clawing at the edge heaves himself up, Frank tugging backwards with amusement flickering in his eyes.

He sits heavily on the roof finally, breathing in shaky breaths. Frank is busily picking up a backpack bulging with things that poke out in odd shapes through the worn material, rifling through it as though making an inventory. Gerard stands up, and looks out – the roofs are flat, and stretch on for miles, with gaps between them. He can see most of the city from here; a fire of some sort burning far away, an ashy column of smoke teetering awkwardly up into the sky; a flag of deep green being waved frantically.

Frank smiles at him, and then turns and walks away.

Gerard follows.

 

*

They walk all day, over the rooftops (Frank takes a running jump at some of the gaps between the walls, or finds something else to help them across – an abandoned clothes line that he swings across on, arm over arm like a monkey, or dragging abandoned planks of wood to the edge and balancing precariously on them; only once does he climb down the wall and then back up the other side, and when Gerard tries to say something to him on solid ground he bares his teeth and snarls), until Gerard's feet ache and his head is spinning from the insistent sun beating down on them.

Eventually, when it gets too dark to see properly, Frank sits them down and begins to pull things out of his backpack. Gerard decides within moments that Frank is a scavenger; most of the items in the bag are monumentally useless (among others, he sees: three broken coat hangers, a discman with no headphones or batteries, a packet of condoms – Gerard raises an eyebrow but Frank doesn't appear to notice, or care – a Mills and Boons novel with the last few pages torn out, and seven pink feathers from a feather boa or something like that), but eventually Frank finds a newspaper and a packet of matches. He disappears off the side of the wall for a moment and returns with an armful of wooden boards, and with ease he lights a fire, coughing a little when a gust of smoke goes straight into his face, but then coming away, face smeared with ash but beaming and proud.

Gerard produces a can of baked beans and a can opener from his bag and offers them almost shyly to Frank; Frank grins, though, and opens it quickly, rummaging in his own bag for two rusty spoons. They share the can in silence, until finally Gerard says, awkwardly, "Where are you going?"

Frank rubs his hand through the hair falling over the back of his neck, tattoos flashing as his sleeve rides up, and shrugs, unconcerned. "I don't know."

Gerard frowns, tilts his head to the side. "Are you looking for anyone?"

"Mope," Frank says easily, takes another spoon of cold baked beans.

"But then," Gerard grits out, frustrated, "Frank – what are you _doing_?"

Frank yawns and stretches, palms face up to the dark sky. "I don't know."

"How can you _not_?" Gerard stares at him, and for a moment Frank looks honestly, truly confused, blinking at Gerard as though he's a stranger. Then, understanding crosses his face and he gives Gerard that look again, the one that makes Gerard feel like he's a small child and Frank knows infinitely better.

"Where are _you_ going, Gerard?" Frank retaliates, and his voice is perfectly calm and kind, but Gerard takes in a sharp breath as though he's been punched, anyway.

"I came _here_! To find _you_."

"Yeah, but," Frank shrugs, looking back at the fire with a small smile. "I'm not going to be much use to you. You'll work that out soon, I guess."

Then he pulls a blanket out of his bag and pulls it over himself, rolls over and goes to sleep without another word.  


*

Frank is always different, and that, Gerard supposes, is his madness: the next morning, when Gerard wakes up, Frank is talking to him from the moment he opens his eyes – rambling about bizarre facts that sound like he's read a book titled something like _1001 Odd Things To Astound Your Friends and Family!_ , and then telling Gerard about the start of the First World War ("They called it the Great War, you know? it changed the world – of course, I guess it didn't end it. So we're one up on them, hey?"), and then switching to a story about a saint called Rahab who had been a prostitute who sheltered spies for Israel ("Se wasn't reformed, that's the thing, when she took them in, she hadn't repented of what she was doing – she just changed sides to worship someone who could give her freedom,"), and then an Irish fairytale about a princess called Emer and an emerald ring (and it's weird, to hear old-fashioned words coming out with an "anyway, like" mixed between them, and long drags at a cigarette).

The next day, though, he is sullen and glares when Gerard tries to talk to him; the third day, he is silent but in a friendly sort of way, and he lies on the edge of the roof when he sees people and listens to their quiet, desperate conversations with something akin to glee, stifling giggles behind a hand like a child; the fourth day he picks a fight with every person they walk above, swinging down the wall to attack them with single-minded ferocity. Sometimes he comes off better, sometimes they do – Gerard always watches in silence, and neither offers assistance or tries to hinder Frank, only hands him a bottle of water when he comes back parched and bloody.

And whether he's talking or not, Frank never offers any insight into himself, into why he's wandering across the roofs of the city, the backpack crammed of shit that has no place anywhere else, or why he even tolerates Gerard trailing behind him.

Things Gerard knows about Frank, then:

1\. He answers questions you haven't gotten around to raising yet, but refuses to speak directly when it comes to important things, mostly because,  
2\. he doesn't remember much about anything that hasn't happened in the last year,  
3\. he has – at last count – seven different smiles, each of them terrible and beautiful, and  
4\. he is utterly, utterly mad.

Gerard takes photographs with his mind for lack of a camera. Truthfully, he longs to draw Frank almost constantly; to sketch out the curve of his back when he bends over, shade in the absentness in his eyes, copy out the tattoos and expand on them, letting them swirl out until they are finally finished.

One afternoon when Frank stops for a rest, Gerard finds an abandoned packet of coloured chalk and, while Frank slowly falls asleep, draws him out on the brick wall that comes up from the edge of the roof, the side of a higher building. Gerard stretches up as high as he can, and when he steps back, hours later, throat dry and covered in chalk dust, Frank is standing and grinning out over the roof, huge and multicoloured, with the scorpion tattoo prominent on his neck and gold flecked in his irises.

The real Frank wakes up and calls for Gerard to come on, apparently not noticing the huge portrait. Gerard looks at it one last time and then signs his name in the bottom, a scrawl that trails off when Frank calls "Gerard!"  


*

"Why the rooftops?" Gerard asks one day.

Frank shrugs, smiles effortlessly, and then, as though by default: "I don't remember."  


*

The thing, though, where Frank is beautiful? Kind of unavoidable. After a week in his company Gerard feels he's passed on from plain _noticing_ to _staring_ , and he would be embarrassed if Frank showed even the tiniest sign that he noticed any observation at all. Frank moves unconsciously, and Gerard's initial impression of something sleek and catlike stays the same, when Frank stretches and moves with an unrehearsed fluid grace, smiles turned out for the world (only the world, Gerard thinks, stopped looking at Frank a long, long time ago, and that's the problem).

It's hard to look at Frank and _not_ want to curl your fingers in underneath his t-shirt, shift it aside slightly so that his collarbones glow in the dim light of the fire, Gerard thinks, to be strong enough not to push his shirt up from the bottom and run your hand along his stomach, his back, and then, okay, fine, push him to the ground and bite hastily at his lips and rock your hips against him until he'll tell you everything, all that's missing in him.

Only Gerard's strong enough, or cowardly enough, to simply sit there and think _Frankie, who the hell are you, anyway?_  


*

Gerard says, one day, "are you hungry?" and Frank turns and there's something feral and awful in his eyes, that Gerard hasn't seen since the day they met, when Frank shot the two men. Gerard thinks, _oh, shit_ , and Frank takes a step forward and his fist swings out and clips Gerard neatly against the mouth.

" _Shut up_ ," Frank grunts, and then throws himself at Gerard, tackling him into the ground and swinging blindly at him, fist connecting with Gerard's chin and then his chest and his stomach, until Gerard curls into a ball and lies there, shaking, as Frank takes one last wild swing at him and then says, voice torn and hoarse, "Stay _away_ from me!"

He stands up and runs away, feet pounding against the flat concrete roof, and Gerard waits until the echoes die away before he uncurls, wipes his sleeve against his eyes angrily where instinctive tears are forming, and tries to catch his breath. he reaches up and touches his swelling mouth gingerly, and his fingers come away red with blood – Gerard coughs and coughs, and feels sick.

Eventually, he stands and picks up his bag, feeling exhausted and with the unaccountable sense of failure resting on his shoulders. He slings the bag over one shoulder and turns his back to the direction where Frank ran, lifts his head up and eyes the way home.

 _Hang on, Mikey_ , he thinks grimly.  


*

And yet – that night, Gerard's just pulled the rug tight around himself and is huddling back against the wall when footsteps ring through the night again. He pulls the knife out from his bag, setting his teeth close and harsh together, and stands up, but it's only Frank.

Only Frank, smiling awkwardly with a somewhat sheepish look in his eyes – not like he's guilty, Gerard thinks numbly, more that he's surprised he's been silly enough to lose Gerard or something. Gerard stares.

"Hey," Frank says, when he reaches him, and he looks curious, stretches out his arm to touch Gerard's swollen lip. when Gerard doesn't say anything (only feels slightly sick that still, after the mindless violence of this morning, his stomach twitches a little bit), Frank presses harder, fingers rough and persistent against his lips.

" _Ow_ ," Gerard says, and Frank giggles his stupid, childlike giggle, eyes bright. Gerard glares, and steps away from his reach. "It's not _funny_ , Frank!"

"Sorry," Frank says, automatically regretful. He shrugs his shoulders a little and Gerard wonders for a second if he even _remembers_ that he was the one who hurt Gerard this morning. Gerard stares at him and Frank says, "Shall I light the fire?"

When Gerard doesn't say anything, Frank shrugs and turns away, walks towards the edge of the roof to grab his bag. on the back of his shirt, upside-down, is one of those square stickers with a beaming sun on them, and the word _SMILE_ printed boldly underneath it.

 _Gerard thinks of Jamia and her pale, wrecked beauty, then breathes in and looks away.  
_

*

 _In the end, it's Frank who moves forward and around the fire; Frank who rests his forehead against Gerard's and watches him, eyes quiet and serious and voice only a little bit odd when he says, "I'm fairly sure this is how it goes, anyway," and then leans forward and presses his dry, hot mouth against Gerard's._

 _Gerard makes a rough choking noise but Frank presses closer, fingers curling in Gerard's hair and Gerard closes his eyes, then opens them again to find Frank staring at him, slightly cross-eyed. Gerard breaks away a little, then leans forward again, and then away, hands shaking, unsure as to where he wants to be. Finally, he kisses Frank again, and mumbles against his lips, "You know, you're really kind of fucked up."_

 _Frank laughs, loud and clear in the night. "Yeah," he sighs, and then the fire flares up and Frank tugs Gerard's shirt up and off him, pulling his own off impatiently and then pushing Gerard onto the ground (and so that's different than the way Gerard imagined it, anyway; but when Gerard tries to roll him over Frank shakes his head, says, "no, let me," and Gerard stops). His hips snap forward and Gerard moans, pressing his wet mouth against Frank's neck. Frank rocks forward again and then seems to get bored, unzips Gerard's jeans hastily and curls his hand around Gerard, so that he bucks up and gasps, surprised._

 _Frank leans down and kisses him again, and then jerks him off as precisely as he can, though his rhythm's a little wonky and he bites his lip awkwardly, as though he's not quite sure what he's doing. Gerard doesn't last long – he hasn't touched himself in ages, it's too weird to do it when you're sleeping close to someone for warmth (and, oh yeah, the _world's ended_ ), and he comes with Frank's name unspoken on his lips._

Gerard falls back limply and Frank, infuriatingly, laughs again, short and high. Gerard realises, suddenly, that Frank's still hard through his jeans – he says, "oh, you haven't—" and fumbles awkwardly at Frank's jeans, curls a hand around his cock. Gerard hasn't done this in what feels like years, but Frank's head falls back and he breathes unsteadily up at Gerard, mouth forming whispers that Gerard can't quite catch. He comes pretty quickly, too, and Gerard thinks it's weird how the not-exactly-normal but still taken-for-granted things ended with the war, too, sex and booze and this, a guy lying still and heavy against you, head fallen forward onto your chest, hair damn and limp.

Gerard is tired, and lonely. He burrows closer to Frank and closes his eyes, and the world goes dark again.  


*

When he wakes up, Frank's crouched by the ashes of the fire, poking through them with a stick and a curious expression, as though he'd never seen anything like them before. Gerard remembers Mikey on that first morning, burning his fingers on the coals, and sucks in a sharp breath, surprised at the sudden ache in his chest.

Frank looks around and smiles at him, a brilliant flash and Gerard knows that it's going to be one of Frank's good days, where he talks but not too much, where he'll walk close and do his best to answer any questions. Gerard thinks that it's as much luck of the draw as it was last night, but his heart beats a little faster, anyway, when Frank walks towards him, slowly at first, and then lurching a little at the end to kiss awkwardly at the corner of his mouth. Gerard lets out a surprised gust of laughter, and Frank surveys him anxiously, says, "That's okay, right? I'm allowed to do that?"

"Hey, yeah," Gerard mumbles, and curls his fingers in Frank's hair, tugs him close and kisses him properly, "yeah, you're allowed."  


*

The first thing that Gerard is surprised and secretly, defiantly relieved about is that Frank didn't just forget, the way he does whole conversations sometimes, or the way he forgot throwing himself at Gerard and punching him into the ground, eyes furious and afraid. The second thing is that Frank seems to like it more than just walking in silence, likes wandering over and pressing his mouth against Gerard's cheekbone and taking his hand and threading their fingers together while he talks-talks-talks. He looks at Gerard with eyes that are slightly surprised and there's an odd edge of gratefulness there that makes Gerard uncomfortable, like Frank's too happy to have this.

 _I am the lucky one_ , he almost says, until Frank stops the words from leaking out with his mouth and Gerard thinks of Helena and Mikey and Jamia and Frank, with his goddamn changing smiles, and thinks _no one is lucky anymore. there are just moments when it's easier to be happy you're not dead._

Bitter thoughts or not, Frankie's mouth is sweet, and his touch light.  


*

Gerard thinks it's a Tuesday morning (because somewhere, in the back of his head, he still counts the days, doesn't want to give that up) that Frank says, cheerfully, "Who's Mikey?"

Gerard jolts backwards from where he's fixing black tea (they found a packet of it in a dumpster bin two nights ago) in a saucepan and stares at Frank, eyes huge. "What?" he says, almost hysterically. "What'd you say?"

"Mikey," Frank says. "You said his name in your sleep last night. is he dead, now?"

"No," Gerard bites out, too sharply. Frank takes a step back, eyes wide and a little bit hurt. "No, he's. He's my brother. He's still in the town a couple of miles back."

"Okay," Frank yawns, and accepts the facts easily, without question. "So are you gonna go see him again someday?"

"I'll go back," Gerard says firmly, not thinking about what he's saying. "One day soon, I'll go back, and I'll stay with him, this time."

"Oh," Frank says. He looks startled, and then he laughs. There is an expression in his eyes as though he's vaguely amused at himself, at his own stupidity, but when Gerard questions him, he turns away.  


*

Frank doesn't change. Gerard thinks maybe he would have, some crazy part of him hoping that there's something in the way their mouths collide, slippery and red and wet, that could fix him, make him someone ( _not broken_ , Bob says in his head, eyes grave in the dark, _go now, and leave Mikey here, and then I'll believe you when you say you'll come back_ – Mikey, oh, wait just a little longer). But it doesn't, for all the ways Frank presses back against him hungrily, or twists and lets out tiny, stuttering moans with Gerard behind him, licking in deeper, pressing his tongue in as far as he can and Frank's eyes wild and his mouth bleeding from where he bit down too hard.

But Frank doesn't change. Frank is Frank, Gerard supposes, and Frank's been this way for a long time before Gerard got here, and Gerard guesses he'll be the same when Gerard goes, too. Frank doesn't speak to him some days and still picks fights on other days, and the only thing that's changed is that Gerard gets better at ducking.  


*

Afterwards, Gerard supposes that he had been waiting for that night for a long time, since the first blur of Frank dropping down in a flash of fury, or since Ray Toro told him about the crazy boy he should look for, or even since the night Mikey and Gerard picked up their belongings and left the only home they'd ever had. At the beginning of it, though, he is only aware of being cold, and Frank seeming to guess that, crowding close after he'd lit the fire. Frank breathes along his jaw and watches him while Gerard studiously evades his gaze.

"What are you thinking about?" Frank asks eventually, eyes shining and earnest. It's on one of his good days; he speaks coherently the whole time, even logically, and he's in a good mood, the type where he sidles up to Gerard and kisses him, again and again, as though he can't believe his luck. Gerard has learnt to stop regretting the end of these days and to simply enjoy them.

Gerard is thinking about Frank, about how he rubs awkwardly and unconsciously at his tattoos sometimes, about how he twitches in his sleep and makes terrified faces, mouth stretching into twisted shapes, about how gentle he can be, about the smash and fierce sting of Frank's fist into his nose. All he says, though, is, "How sick I am of baked beans."

Frank laughs, but he says, "No, you're not." Gerard opens his mouth, wondering whether Frank's disagreeing with him as to the trail of his thoughts or about him disliking baked beans, but Frank fists his hands in Gerard's shirt and kisses him, hungrily, sort of desperately. Gerard stops breathing for a moment, uneasy even as the warmth and fire in Frank floods into his blood, and then he moves forward in a surge, their teeth banging, Frank biting hard on Gerard's bottom lip and the soothing it, sucking it messily into his mouth. Gerard groans something quiet under his breath and presses close enough to Frank to actually _feel_ the rush of space between them when Frank breaks away enough to mutter breathlessly, eyes dancing, "You know, sometimes I'm not even sure if you love me or hate me."

Gerard freezes as Frank leans back in, and slowly pushes him back. "Frank," he says, and Frank makes a small, whining noise, tries to kiss him again. " _Frankie_ ," Gerard insists, though, and then takes a breath. "Hey, why are you. Like this. Frankie?" Frank laughs nervously, almost ruefully, and twines his fingers through Gerard's, raises their clasped hands to his mouth and bites gently on Gerard's knuckle. "Frank?" Gerard persists, and Frank nods.

"Yeah, alright." He laughs again, small and breathless, and then looks at Gerard as though he's been waiting for this for a long time, too. "I forget stuff, Gerard. When things leave, I forget them. people or places, whatever." He looks a little regretful, but not altogether upset. "I started it at the beginning. The whole, you know, protecting yourself thing. It was gonna be easy. I mean, it wasn't, of course, it was hard at first, to force yourself to… whatever. It got easier. Now I do it automatically, can't help it. And I forget other things sometimes? Like who people are." He yawns, shrugs his shoulders. "That's it, basically. I guess it'll get worse. I don't really – it's not like it _hurts_."

Gerard stares at him blankly. "So if I left?"

Frank smiles at him, kind but still a little off-beat, and Gerard can see it now, the humming under his skin, the relentless shifting, the moving past and through him of ideas and thoughts and people. "I'd forget you. Like I forget everyone."

Gerard rubs his hands over his face tiredly, eyes closed so he can't see Frank's face when he speaks again. "And what if I stayed?"

"That would be nice," Frank says, and his voice is wistful, with something slightly deeper underneath that, an undercurrent of longing, maybe. "Gerard, I wish you would. I'd like that."

"But you might—" Gerard stops. The silence drags along by Gerard's feet, exhausted.

"I could," Frank says, and looks away for the first time, eyes cast down, smiling oddly. "Yeah, I guess I'd just start… forgetting things anyway, all the time. Even if they were there."

"So," Gerard says awkwardly, both of them knowing the answer before the question, Gerard still doggedly tracking a clearly spelled out statement from Frank. _This will end_ , he thinks a little dizzily, even as he opens his mouth to continue talking. "You could wake up one morning, and not know who I am?"

Frank lets out a breath and says, "Yes." Gerard watches him, the slow sweep of his eyelashes against his skin, the way one hand curls into a loose fist, thumb scratching absently against his knuckles. There's an odd burning in Gerard's throat, like he's swallowed too-strong cordial too quickly. He nods, and smiles with some effort.

"Okay," he says finally, and presses a warm, unbalanced kiss to the corner of Frank's mouth. He stands up, and dusts off his jeans. "I'm gonna go, now."

Frank smiles wryly into the fire. "I thought you might." He sits perfectly still, back bent and coiled towards the warmth while Gerard shuffles around behind him, shoving bits and pieces into his backpack. When Frank stands up, eventually, he looks at Gerard and takes a startling, shuddering breath. "I'm being selfish, I know," he admits, and crosses to Gerard, twists a bit of his hair back behind his ear. Gerard shifts uneasily at the brush of Frank's fingers on his skin, and Frank makes a face. "I do love you, you know," he says, almost sweetly.

"I know," Gerard says. "But it won't be enough."

"No," Frank agrees absently. His eyes look sad, but resigned, and Gerard knows what he's thinking: that for Frank, this will hurt, but only for a very little while.

No comfort like this for Gerard. _Mikey_ , he thinks and, turning his back to Frank, walks away into the cloudy, starless night.  


*

Travelling back, Gerard thinks, is always easier, always faster, no matter what the circumstances that cause it. On the second day _going-home_ , Gerard climbs down from the roof, too tired of the wave of nausea and tightness in his throat when he sees the ashen heaps of the fires they made. He finds himself on a main road, to his surprise, and follows it as best as he can towards the outer edge of town, where he came from.

(He spends the only night on the road curled in between a pile of wooden boxes and crates in a side street off the main road and slips, in the night, until he wakes up in the morning with his face tilted up to the sun at an angle. On the wall above him, higher up, he can see half of Frank's face, huge and glorious in flaking, fading chalk. Gerard stumbles to the end of the alleyway and throws up, head reeling, until there's nothing left in his stomach and he's choking on bile.)

Soon it becomes clear, though, that Frank took a long, meandering path over the roofs, odd detours and strange corners that Gerard hadn't noticed. Simply following the main road, Gerard is back in the place where Frank first found him within another day, and by the time the sun is setting he's out of the city, on the road leading back to Mikey.

Gerard is tired but not tired; he doesn't sleep again, walks through the night, knife clutched in his hand, but no cars go by this time. He thinks maybe he's a little bit braver now, just a very little bit. He had the courage to leave Frank, at least.

When the sun rises, he's on the edge of the city.  


*

Somewhere between rooftops and Frank finding new inventive ways to cross the gaps without touching the ground, Gerard has picked up a sense of direction. He finds the bottle shop where he and Mikey spent their first night in the city easily and wanders down the roads that Brian led them down, tired now, drooping forward with dark eyes, bags clear under them.

The streets look different from down here, still, and Gerard's feet feel uneasy so low down. He knows, of course, that logically he never saw the streets of _this_ city from above, but somehow he's picked up the habit of imagining things from above (only in a harsh kind of way, that bites at his stomach with short, spiky teeth, because it's up high and above with Frank at his side, hand brushing against Gerard's neck, laughter ringing through the air).

Eventually, when he honestly can't walk for much longer he slips down another side street and tucks himself away between rubbish. When he sleeps he dreams in painful, vivid detail of Frank, eyes wide and gleeful, running across a roof, away from Gerard. Gerard yells out for him to stop but Frank only laughs and then throws himself off the roof, and he's flying. Then Gerard wakes up with a jerk and a muttered curse and wipes the bad taste in his mouth away with a sleeve. He stands and looks up at the darkening sky, realises that it's getting late, that autumn's almost over.

He walks back to the open street and scratches uneasily at the tight feeling in his spine. The buildings all look the _same_ , and he blinks and blinks but can't remember which one held the underground tunnel. He wonders if there are other gangs living in them, if whether trying each of them out will get him killed.

And then, a quiet sort of miracle, Mikey appears from a doorway, blinking into the sunlight. Gerard sets his bag down and they stare at each other for a moment, and then Mikey walks forward and punches Gerard.

It's not a very good punch, actually; Mikey's not very strong, and his fist glances easily off Gerard's cheekbone – besides, Gerard's used to Frank's furious, defiant fists and Mikey doesn't come close to that. but it catches him off-guard, and he stumbles backward, until Mikey takes another rushing step forward and _clings_ to Gerard, mumbles, "You fucking _asshole_ , I'm never gonna forgive you," and buries his face in Gerard's neck.

Gerard's arms come up slowly and he holds Mikey close, hands shaking a little bit.

"I know," he says. "I'm sorry anyway."

Mikey pulls back a little, mouth clenched in a thin, tight line, but his eyes are softer. He smiles slowly, unsurely, and then his eyes focus in on something on Gerard's shoulder, reaching out to touch a spot on Gerard's skin where his shirt has slipped to the side. "Hey, what's—" he trails off, and Gerard tilts his head to look.

There is a small, fading bruise there, but Gerard knows it is the imprint of Frank's mouth and teeth, guesses that Mikey knows it's something along those lines too. He's trembling suddenly; Frank's far, far away now, smile flashing as kindly and absently as it always did, but not for Gerard anymore. Frank doesn't even know who Gerard is, now.

"Mikey," Gerard croaks, and Mikey reaches out, takes his hand.  


*

Gerard is vaguely surprised by how ill he feels, all of a sudden, but mostly he just hates the way his chest is tight, the way each foot landing feels odd and hollow, as though he's gone to put his foot up on a stair only to find there's nothing there.

Mikey knows, of course, knows immediately that something's wrong; he gently holds the crook of Gerard's elbow in his hand and guides him into the building, down the stairs and into the dark tunnel. Gerard stops and says, "I have a flashlight—" but Mikey shakes his head, says, "Don't worry about it." Gerard realises that he's been gone for a month; Mikey's walked back and forth the tunnel enough times to not need a light.

They reach the stairs, and then head up into the top room, again. Gerard remembers, but in a detached sort of sense. Memory is a strange, lonely thing, now. Gerard thinks of Frank, swallows against the burn in his throat.

Bob's not there, but Ray is, and he walks forward, says with fervent relief in his voice, "Gerard. You came back."

Gerard nods, dully, and looks away. Ray's eyes are bright and unhappy – he draws Mikey aside for a moment and they whisper with low, urgent tones, head bent close together. Gerard hears _Frank Iero_ and blinks, because he never knew Frank's last name.

He notices, suddenly, Jamia shuffling closer towards them from her corner of the room. When she gets close enough she reaches out and claws her fingers into Ray's shoulder, shakes him urgently. "You shouldn't _say_ those things," she says, voice rough, like she's trying not to cry. "Please, Ray, don't, don't blame him."

Mikey opens his mouth, eyes dark and angry, but Gerard speaks first. "He doesn't," he says slowly, and then stops, feeling an overwhelming urge to laugh, because he understands Jamia's hysteria, now, and he understands the reasons why Brendon's fingers shook as he compulsively smoothed Ryan's quilt, over and over again. "He can't _help_ it."

Jamia looks at him and nods, just once. Gerard turns his back to a staring Mikey and walks to the mattress in the corner of the room, pulls the blanket up over his head and lies there, with open, empty eyes, until he finally falls asleep.

And dreams of Frank.  


*

Gerard stays in the pile of blankets for a week, and then Mikey guides him up and out into another room, where there's a lukewarm bath waiting. Gerard strips off dully and lowers himself in, scrubs at the fading bruises left and the odd cut every now and then where Frank sank his teeth in too far until his skin turns pink, and then he ducks his head under the water again and again, opens his eyes so that he can see the swirl of his dark hair just out of reach, faded and soft, until he's gasping for breath and Mikey shouts from outside the doorway, "Gerard?"

Gerard climbs out and gets dressed, returns wordlessly to his bed. Mikey bites his lip but Gerard just pulls the blankets around him again, and stares at the wall.

Outside, it turns to winter, starts to rain.  


*

Gerard sleeps during the day and then lies awake at night, with Mikey sleeping restlessly at his side, twisting awkwardly from side to side, and someone snoring softly on the other side of the room. He stares at the ceiling and tries not to feel too sorry for himself, and sometimes he even manages it.

But Gerard has worked out another thing about Frank: the paradox of everything that Frank has shifted himself into being is that Frank himself is infinitely, unfairly memorable. Memorable in the _unforgettable_ sense, in the _dreaming-waking_ sense, in the lingering taste he leaves in Gerard's mouth and the warmth of his hands curled, still, around Gerard's wrists.

Jamia comes and crouches by his bed one night and for once Gerard doesn't pretend to be asleep, sits up and lets her hold his hand. "You understand, now," she says, and Gerard nods, because Jamia may not be in love with Frank anymore (Gerard doesn't think Jamia can love _anything_ anymore – when Jamia turned away from Frank on a similar night to Gerard's, there had been no Mikey for her to come back to) but she knows that there is no real life after Frank, that there can be nothing after Frank smiling wide and joyous, and the tilt of his head when he considers a new jump between the tops of two buildings, and the way he smokes a cigarette.

"It gets easier," she says, gently, but Gerard doesn't want Jamia's kind of easier, doesn't want the reckless protection of Frank she has without any real comfort in the way he used to hold her. Jamia's kind of easier is too similar to Frank's for Gerard to be able to look forward to it.

Jamia sits there a while longer, but lets go of Gerard's hand. He doesn't mind, isn't confused or challenged by her anymore, and he knows when to talk and when to be silent around her. As it is, they exchange a glance, and Gerard says, "You're doing okay, Jamia," and she laughs, quiet and serious, and then nods. He knows she is doing her very best to believe him.

When she moves back to her own corner Gerard lies back down, and thinks in terms of breaths, counts seconds and snores. Mikey mumbles something in his sleep, and Gerard blinks up at the ceiling. The nights take too long in this place; the mattress beneath him is relatively soft, unmistakably different from the hard concrete of the rooftops, and the blankets are cold.  


*

Gerard dreams that Frank's flying, again. He runs to the end of the rooftop and waits there, with the desperate hope that Frank will turn back for him.

When he wakes up, he's shivering, and Mikey's watching him with something akin to despair in his eyes. "Hi," he says, slowly. Outside, he can hear the rain thundering past the window.

"Hi," Gerard croaks, and then falls back to sleep. His dreams are dark and bloody, with the sound of sirens wailing and his mother's screams. Frank is nowhere to be found.  


*

"Hey," Mikey says, and Gerard blinks drowsily, unwilling to wake up. but Mikey's tone is urgent, and when Gerard rubs the fuzz in his eyes away his expression is tight and concerned. "Hey, Gee, we have to go. It's raining too hard, the tunnel's filling up."

"What?" Gerard mumbles, still bleary.

"The rain," Mikey says impatiently. "It's filling up the tunnel, slowly, but – Bob thinks we'll be cut off from the city in a few hours. We don't have enough supplies, and this building's all boarded up, we can't get out. We need to leave _now_."

"Right," Gerard says, and pulls himself up from the floor. His bones ache, and he tries to stretch the stiffness away. He tries to remember the last time he stood up, and fails. "Right, I'm – I'm coming."

"Pack your stuff," Mikey tells him, and Gerard stumbles, shoving things into his old backpack, the one he had with Mikey, not Frank. That backpack is only useful things, rugs and small bits of kindling and one last can of baked beans, and it's gone – Gerard guesses someone has already taken it.

He stands up and Bob says, "Let's go," tersely, from the doorway, where the small group is standing in a huddle. Jamia is sniffing a little bit, but Brian has his arm around her. Gerard knows it's hard, sometimes, to disassociate any kind of leaving with Frank.

"Right," Gerard says, voice hoarse and Bob nods. They turn away from the small apartment and go.  


*

The tunnel is filling slowly but surely with water, and when they wade through it's about up to Gerard's knees. His jeans scrape awkwardly, waterlogged, against his skin and he starts shivering after a while, teeth chattering. Mikey presses close to him, and Gerard pretends it's because he's a kind of protection, though really he knows that Mikey's just keeping him warm.

Looking after him. Again.

Outside, the light is blue and dark, and the rain is a kind of light, streaks of white shining clear. it's thick enough that Gerard ducks his head, gasping, and Jamia holds her face up to the sky, opens her mouth and lets it fill with water, giggling. Mikey only smiles, ducking his head and taking off his glasses and wiping the water uselessly off with his shirt – when he puts them back on, the rain spatters them again. Gerard laughs, hoarsely, surprising himself _and_ the rest of the group; Mikey blinks at him and then looks away, but Gerard sees the tilt of his cheek lifting.

Bob says, "I know a place. It's a bit of a walk, but better than nothing," and Ray turns around to head up the end of the group, where Mikey and Gerard trail. He presses warm fingers against Gerard's neck and Gerard shrinks back into his jacket, laughter fading. Mikey's lips settle back into a thin, tight line.

After a while, the rain fades to something taken for granted. Gerard's soaked through but he thinks he's stopped shivering, or at least stopped noticing how cold he is. Even the noise of it seems to soften; Gerard shoves his hands in his pockets and just walks, until the constant buzz of his thoughts softens too, and there's just walking through the rain. Every now and then a single streetlight is lit, and that sets Gerard to worrying and wondering again, but when they pass it by and nothing goes wrong, it soon flickers out of his thoughts.

He is surprisingly peaceful, then, when Jamia makes a harsh, choking noise and stumbles backwards. She bumps into Mikey and then hides behind Brian, latching onto his sleeve and pressing her mouth to his shoulder, her breathing loud enough to carry over the rain.

"What's going on?" Mikey says, at the same time that Bob hisses in a breath and says,

"Gerard?"

Gerard looks up, and stops.

Before the war, Gerard thinks, Frank must have watched a lot of Hugh Grant movies. He looks perfectly comfortable, walking easily through the rain towards them, backpack slung over one shoulder, face patient and calm. Gerard shrinks back in his hoodie, back leaning towards Mikey, and Mikey says, "Oh." He pauses for a moment, and then murmurs, "You should probably do something, Gerard."

Gerard hands his backpack to Mikey and then steps forward, once, and then again. Frank catches sight of him and stills, before finally offering a small smile, tiny and hopeful. Gerard's tongue feels swollen in his mouth – he doesn't understand how Frank's here, or how the recognition flashed in his eyes, or why he's smiling like that.

"Um," he mumbles, chin pointing down to the ground.

Frank takes a tiny step forward and says, somewhat unsurely, "Gerard?"

"You don't," Gerard tells him, "you can't, um – how is this _possible_? Frank?"

Frank lets his backpack slip to the ground, and Gerard watches blankly as a puddle gathers around it, the material getting wet along the bottom. Distracted, he looks up and Frank's standing too close, Gerard can see how his eyelashes are wet and sticking together, can see the relief mingling with fear in his eyes. Frank says, "Please, let me just—" and Gerard says nothing, only stares at him. Frank slides forward, hands clutching at Gerard's shoulders and then sliding past, around and behind his neck, until he's curled up against him, and then he releases the breath he's been holding against Gerard's neck, and presses his face into his Gerard's skin. It's wet, Gerard thinks numbly, with the rain, and then he's pressing himself against Frank, clinging mindlessly to his skin with the bump of his ribs and the smooth warmth that he emits, even now, even in this rain.

Gerard lets out a choking, twisted sound and listens to Frank breathing in his skin, tries to push closer, furious when it appears it's not possible. And then Frank's hands are holding Gerard's face and he says, a little desperately, "I'm not too late, right? I came as fast as I could once I worked it out," and before Gerard can ask _what_ and _too late for who_ and _why_ Frank's kissing him, mouth warm and fierce on his, tongue slipping past Gerard's lips and _oh god_ this is familiar.

"Please," Frank mumbles against his mouth when they break apart enough to breathe, and Gerard can feel the rest of the group's eyes on him, can't muster the spirit to care. "Can I stay with you? I'll, I'll be good, this time, I know now."

"Yes," Gerard says, breathlessly, and then, "Frank, what are you – why are you here? What are you _doing_?"

Frank laughs, high and a little desperate. "I can't stop remembering," he says, and kisses Gerard again, their teeth colliding, Frank biting at Gerard's lower lip. He stops and repeats himself, voice full of wonder. "I can't stop remembering."

The rain swells around them and Mikey coughs, shuffles at the ground. Gerard reaches down and takes Frank's hand, raises Frank's knuckles to his mouth and bites on one, gently. Frank lets out a confused, grateful breath, and Gerard understands.


End file.
